Random Update

My BFF asked for a blog post and it's been a while so I'm taking a bit of time to do a quick update for my dear buddy and fellow readers in the blogosphere. Before Christmas, I got really into crocheting and found that the Michael's crappy hooks just weren't cutting it so Jamie and I put in a big order on KnitPicks and I made a sweet hook holder for all my new toys using this pattern. 

We also made Charlotte's first Christmas ornaments using a simple salt dough recipe. It took a lot of tries to get her little hand and foot to cooperate. I'm glad that salt dough is very forgiving and easy to work with. I think they turned out adorable and I can't wait to hang them on our tree next year! 

I did my very first DIY RLR diaper insert strip because Charlotte got this terrible rash from having diarrhea and I thought it wouldn't hurt to strip the diapers just in case there was some ammonia build up. I absolutely love cloth diapering and have been very sad that I haven't been able to for the last 3 months because Charlotte's poor rash just isn't healing and I'm using all these non-cloth diaper safe products to try and protect her skin. She's got extremely sensitive and finicky skin so hopefully we can make our way back to cloth soon. 

We also picked up a bunch of picture frames from Ikea when they had a sale. I was envisioning this wall for quite some time and Ikea just happened to have frames on sale and a display conveniently put up that I fell in love with so we just stole the whole idea. Jamie didn't really have a choice but to put it up because we had no room to store the frames since we were hosting Christmas dinner for 20 people. Unfortunately, the frames are still sitting empty. Yet another project to tackle. 

With the amount of hoarding I do with crafting goods, I knew I wanted to make some tag blankets with the vast, VAST amount of ribbon I own. I managed to sneak away one Monday night to a friend's house and hunkered down for 2 hours. I think I used about 0.02% of my ribbon. 

We've been doing a lot more cooking since I started maternity leave. A new salad dressing that I've been obsessed with is this lemon garlic concoction. I don't remember where I found the recipe, but those who know me know that I'm not good with measurements so I'll just list off the ingredients. 

Kick Butt Lemon Dressing 
- olive oil
- lemon juice from 1/2 to 1 lemon
- salt and pepper
- mashed garlic
- oregano 
- a tiny bit of sugar if you want

It's seriously so yummy that it got Jamie actually enjoying salad! One thing to note though, the garlic is what makes the dressing so one must be okay with stinky raw garlic breath. Below are just some random shots. I attempted to make this White chicken Chili and although it didn't turn out like the recipe, it was still delicious. 

A few girlfriends and I are trying to get back into shape post baby so I've been doing baby barre class where you strap baby to you while doing ballet moves and strollercize (which is essentially working out while baby stays in the stroller). I've also managed to get in a couple walks with the warm weather we were having. Whatever little time that Charlotte is napping and I have my hands free, I'm trying to catch up on my Project Life. I'm only about 2 years behind now. Jamie is de-cluttering the basement and finally recycling all his university textbooks. Makes me sad knowing we both spent thousands and thousands of dollars on those damn things that we can't even use as firewood. They are literally worthless paperweights that are taking up valuable storage space, but yet I cringe at the thought of dumping them. How Asian of me. 

To end off this random update, say hi to the puppies! 

Khuno Turns 5

I can't believe my little pup turned 5 last week. I would take you on a trip down memory lane with some photos of Khuno as a puppy but our network drive is down so I can't access them. Needless to say, he was cute as can be with him being all of a whopping 10 pounds. I still remember picking him up from the airport cargo area. We heard his poor puppy barks from the waiting area and our hearts instantly melted. He's caused us a lot of grief over these past 5 years, but we can't imagine our lives without him. He brings us such joy. I mean, look at that face. How can you not love him? The little hat was compliments of +Cynthia Chau. I'm glad Khuno has a little cousin, Audi, to keep him young at heart. Happy 5th birthday my sweet puppy. 

Sunday Update

Can you believe Christmas will be here in 16 days?!? I swear every year it seems Christmas creeps up faster and faster. I've decided against posting from my iPad because it's so dang slow and it's very frustrating trying to maneuver pictures around. Blogger already make that hard enough as it is and I don't need Apple to make it harder. I just wanted to give a few updates on what's been happening in the life of the Khau's. I had my very first after-hours Christmas party. Can you believe that after 7 years, this is my very first one?! It's sad but true. Jamie was sporting his Movember mustache, which I wasn't a huge fan of but at least he shaved the rest of his face. 

We've been having regular family dinners and Jamie's side of the family has been held at their new house on the north side. They're doing a lot of painting and they're smart to not actually move in until the painting is complete. It's much closer to drive there and there's a huge fenced backyard for Khuno too! Jane's been crocheting up a storm, just in time for the cold weather we've been having. Here's Khuno posing in a neat little accessory Jane made. It's a hood/scarf, hoarf? 
Now I know all of you have heard about the new roasted kale chips craze. It's the bee's knees right now of "health" snacks but what we have discovered is roasted brussel sprouts! They taste almost like roasted kale chips except meatier. All we did was pick up some gorgeous looking sprouts at Costco, quartered them up, drizzled them with oil and sprinkled them generously with salt and pepper. Pop them in the oven and roast at 375, checking on them regularly until they're nice and burnt toasty. They're so good I ate them at 11 the other night as chips. 
This last picture is to update you on our camera situation. After we took photos of James and Julie, Jamie dropped our camera and broke the shutter. The beloved Nikon D60 is quite old and when we asked about repair costs, it just isn't worth us spending the money to ship it to Nikon for fixing. So we hummed and haaa-ed about whether or not we should get a new camera for the last couple of months. One Saturday afternoon we stopped into Vistek to do some window shopping. You all know where this is going. Whether it's home, furniture, SPCA window shopping, it's always a bad idea to go and "look". In this case, it was no exception. We are now the proud owners of a new camera and although we couldn't afford to get a new lens to go with the sexy new camera body, Jamie's previous thinking ahead and buying a FX lens saved the day. Hopefully this upcoming year will bring back some better photos. 

Bringing it around back full circle to the Sunday update, Jamie spent most of the day working and I spent it crafting while listening to Christmas Pop music on Jango. I managed to sneak in some crocheting after lunch and some intermittent reading of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Top that all off with a home cooked meal and I must say, it wasn't that bad of a day. It's dinner time so I bid you all good night. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 57: Swimming Time!

How ridiculously cute are these two? My brother wanted to go to the dog park a few weekends ago so instead of driving all the way to their end of town, we made them come to us! If you've never walked along the Gold Bar off-leash train, please go! It runs parallel to the North Saskatchewan River and it stretches on and on. We used this trail to train Khuno how to be off-leash. It's not a big open field and yes, there are bushes he can run into and rivers he can jump into, but we usually manage to keep him coming back to us by running in the opposite direction. My brother wanted to bring along Chalkie too. We had three dogs under control for almost the entire walk. 

Right at the very start of the trail, there is a bend in the path and a little direct pathway that leads down to the river. Khuno disappeared so fast down that river path and Audi joined in on the fun. We looked down to see that we were 30 seconds too late and both dogs had jumped right into the frigid water. We climbed down to the river to have some fun with them since the dirtiness was already done. Little Chalkie doesn't have experience with moving water and since he loves hanging with the big boys, he hopped right into the water with them. His head dipped under and as he pounced back up to get air with little legs frantically doggy paddling, his eyes showed instant panic. I shouted to everyone that Chalkie was going to drown and my brother was on it! I mean, ON IT. Within a split second, he whipped the water bottle strapped around his chest off and threw it to the ground all while running into the water to grab his beloved dog. Joke was on him though because Chalkie's little legs got him far enough in that he was able to touch the ground and hop back onto shore. It was definitely scary though because if you know pugs, their breathing sucks. And inhaling dirty river water can't be a good thing. 

We hosed Khuno down in the front yard because he had way too much dirt clinging to his underbelly and then bathed him in the tub. We don't do this often as you can imagine the amount of work it is, but one trick to drying him after a bath is to use a shop vac. If you plug the hose into the other end of the shop vac where the air shoots out, you instantly have a cool air dryer! Works great and I feel a lot safer using that than a hair dryer. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 52: Shedding Season

Those that have been to my house might think that Khuno sheds all year round but he has his periods of massive shedding. You can usually tell it's shedding time when you can pull large quantities of fur off his snout. This past weekend Jamie and I decided to tag team the brushing and after 2 hours of brushing and Olympic catch up on the PVR, this is what we were left with. I ended up trimming a lot of his gross fur, especially on his underbelly. Jamie said he looked like a sheared sheep. What I really enjoyed doing (kinda sick I know...) was taking my metal comb and slowly picking at the underbelly fur. It was almost like combing a fro or what I'd think picking at a fro would feel like. I was able to take his super short underbelly fur and just work it with my comb until the fur became long and loose again. I was able to extend his fur by almost an inch! Eventually Khuno got tired of getting manhandled and we figured one grocery bag of nasty fur was enough. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 50: Puppy Love?

Khuno's cousin, Audi, came over for a play date the other night. They can play for hours as long as Khuno gets rest periods every so often. That night they were taking turns rolling onto their back. Cynthia managed to capture Khuno giving Audi a little lovin'. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 49: Ghetto What?

Ghetto rain coat, holla! All this rain has made it miserable walking Khuno. This is especially true when it's non-stop rain all day and Khuno's gotta go. I was able to slap on my long rain coat and rain boots but since I was home alone, I didn't want to have to deal with a soaking wet dog on my own. I had bought him a rain coat way back but it was one (or two or three) sizes too small. His underbelly fur gets wet and full of grit so I really wanted to minimize underbelly exposure. I couldn't bring the bag all the way to the end because then he wouldn't be able to pee. I ended up using my hair tie to secure the bag to Khuno's tail. It was working great until the bag started slipping forward, causing his front legs to get tripped up. I had no choice but to pull it back a bit and I got stuck with some pee going into the bag. I'll have to whip up something better in the future, but for now the ghetto rain coat kept a good portion of him dry. Don't judge. Unless your judgement is, "Wow so smart!"

Another Year Wiser

With the wisdom comes many other things... Age, gray hairs, fine lines, belly fat, the list goes on and on. With each birthday that passes, I find myself less wanting to celebrate but more wanting to reflect on the year gone by. Remember when we were young and birthdays meant family dinners because we hadn't started school yet to make friends? This was me up until grade 7. I had the occasional birthday with neighborhood friends, but because my birthday is in the summer, I never had classmates come. Fast forward to the age where birthday celebrations meant nights out with friends and significant others, eating, drinking and celebrating. I've done my fair share of those as well. The past couple of years I find myself more wanting to revert back to the good ol' days where birthdays were celebrated with a gathering of family and good food. 

Today I celebrated my birthday by going to the downtown City Market with my husband. We had a great lunch at Dauphine's Bakery & Bistro, which included the Trio Plate and the Croque Monsieur, both came with fresh farmer's market salads. Jamie got a latte and it came in this massive bowl that neither one of us has seen before. The waitress said that's how it was traditionally served. 
After lunch we stopped into our favorite coffee shop, Credo, for a London Fog w/ Rooibos tea and a latte.Sipping our drinks, we strolled along the market and purchased a variety of goodies! Fresh peaches from BC, more fresh organic peaches, lemon stuffed olives, whole wheat pita with chili hummus, cherry tomatoes, assorted tomatoes, dandelion honey, and elk antler/bones for Khuno. I also dragged Jamie into my new office building to show him where I work now. 

We got home shortly after and I came downstairs to find a hand drawn card from my hubby, inspired by the London's famous, "Keep calm and carry on" fad. Then we headed off again with Khuno to Rivercree for a buffet dinner with my parents, brother and sister-in-law. We left Khuno with Audi together alone for the first time and when we returned home, poor Khuno was so exhausted. 
It's been a while since we had a fire pit night so we cranked that baby open and made some s'mores. My amazing friends came over and brought birthday cinnamon buns with them for roasting on the fire, something that we've never done before. Something about fires that just makes people want to roast things on a skewer! 
This past year has been full of changes. We became husband and wife, went on an amazing honeymoon, witnessed several of our friends get married, and I took on a new challenge in my career. It really has been a year for adventure and I know the next one will be just as, if not more, exciting for our little family. Our next big project: re-shingling the roof. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 47: Big Ol' Eyes

In case you didn't think my dog was already stinkin' cute, today I have proven you wrong with this photo. His eyes are usually almond shaped. One lady at the dog park even went as far to say, "You can tell he's a samoyed because his eyes are slanted like Chinese people." I kid you not folks, those were her words. And she said it over and over again. Khuno's eyes definitely aren't slanted in this photo. They are what we like to all call "big puppy dog eyes". In case you're wondering why he's got those big ol' eyes, please look to the left of the photo and make note of the Dentastix sitting on the edge of the bed. He's just waiting for me to say okay! Happy Mother's Day everyone. =) 

366 Photo Project - Photo 45: Khuno Turns 4

Khuno recently celebrated his 4th birthday! People say this about their children all the time, but I'm going to say it about my dog. I can't believe it's been 4 years since we got him. He's growing up so fast and in human years, he's 32. Getting close to his papa Jamie's age! He gave me some mega new mom syndrome when we first got him. We were sleep deprived and so irritable with all this bad habits. He didn't listen and he pooped and peed in the house all the time. Fast forward 4 years and he's had a few accidents here and there. He listens sometimes and he's ran off after a rabbit twice. He can manage to be off leash at the dog park and not run away. He can also be off leash in the Gold Bar dog park on the trail that runs along the river, but we turn around the moment we see/hear ducks in the river. The one time we couldn't distract him from the ducks, he jumped into the river to chase them. His pulling on walks continues to drive me crazy but at least he only pulls when there's a reason now. It's either he needs to poop, there's another life form in front, a white car is driving by, or there's a hint of scent that something has left behind. Despite all the headaches and sometimes inconvenient responsibilities of a dog, I would love to have another samoyed. The love they show you when you walk in the house and the forced snuggles I get out of Khuno far outweigh the headaches. Happy birthday my Khuno-muno. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 39: Spring Messes

This is what Jamie and I have to look forward to every time we shower... A aqua tub full of sand that's fallen off of Khuno's underbelly. The rest of the sand slowly falls out all around the house as his fur dries. So if you're wondering why the heck our floors feel like they haven't been swept in forever, the amount of sand you see is from one walk. Khuno gets 2 walks a day. His underbelly is basically a mini sandbox. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 36: Snow Play

You know how dogs do the weirdest things sometimes? Like when they decide to roll around in the snow for no apparent reason? Khuno does that a lot, especially on the snow in our front yard. One day Jamie rings the doorbell while I'm downstairs crafting. I wasn't expecting anyone so I creep upstairs and don't see anyone in the window. I head back downstairs and I hear another doorbell. Now I'm all paranoid and I duck down and race to the backdoor to make sure it's locked and the alarm is on. I head back to the living room all hunched over to check things out and I hear someone rummaging through the mailbox. That's when I see that it's flippin' Jamie! All he said when I opened the door (after I ran to turn off the alarm), "Khuno doesn't want to come inside." So we sat there on the front porch, our little family, taking in the gorgeous winter day. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 35: Puppy Date

I've spent my entire day (literally from 9:30-3:00) processing photos from my camera. As I've said before, I may not post a new picture everyday for this 366 Photo Project but that doesn't mean I'm not taking them! I finally got around to processing the past 2 months worth of photos and I'm so happy to finally delete them off my camera. Jamie has this thing for keeping raw files but they are just so darn massive and annoying to keep. Why you might ask? Because I end up deleting a lot of photos while I'm processing them in Lightroom but I don't keep a list of all the ones I delete. So when I go to clear out my memory card, I don't want to have to sort through them to see which ones I've kept and which ones I've dumped. What happens then is that I end up keeping all the raw files! Jamie's rationale, which I totally agree with, is if I ever needed to go back and edit the photo, the raw file would be a lifesaver. But it's just so many photos!!! If you have any suggestions for me on how to improve my workflow and backing up of files (I'm directing this to you Justin), please let me know. 

Anyways this photo is from way back in February. Julie and I decided to have a Project Life night so she packed up a bit of supplies and her puppy for a night of scrapping and doggy fun. It was really funny watching Toffee because she didn't want to play with Khuno at first and when Khuno finally got tired of waiting for Toffee, that's when she decided she'd poke the big white bear. Don't let her size fool you though because she definitely put Khuno in his place whenever he was being inappropriate. We couldn't get Khuno to sit up beside Julie no matter how hard we tried so we just settled on a laying down picture. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 33: Blowing His Coat

Sometimes the iPhone really is a lifesaver for photo taking isn't it? I actually used it to document my recent San Fran trip this past weekend. It's absolutely terrible in low light situations but the amount of noise in the photo can only be expected. Onto photo 33! The picture is of Khuno's fur that I managed to comb out after 2 hours of sitting with him while watching The Voice. That was only the fur from his back groin area near his hind legs. He hates being brushed and wasn't impressed at all. That little face of his in the photo... imagine his usual smile turned upside down. He managed to tolerate me for about an hour before Jamie had to hold him for the other hour. He's been pretty smelly with the spring weather so I'm hoping combing out some of his undercoat will help that. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 32: Puppies

You gotta love the little critters eh? Actually, they aren't that little. I think Khuno weighed in at 65 pounds last time and Audi checked in at a whopping 58 pounds! I have no idea how much Chalkie weighs, but I'm guessing at least 25. He is a solid ball of pure muscle. They may all look like they're chillaxing, but they were all barking up a storm trying to "speak" to earn their treat. It took my brother, Jamie and my mom to get them quarantined into a group for me to snap some pictures. It's so fun watching them all play together every Saturday at my parents' house. It's more Khuno and Audi that play and Chalkie just sorta sneaks in a sniff or paw here and there. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 30: Family Portrait

This lovely family portrait was taken by our camera that was set on top of a metal pole by a garbage can that we walk by everyday. Needed a bit of cropping because there was just no way to sit it on the metal pole properly. Click and run! I bet we're going to be doing a lot of that in Europe. 

366 Photo Project - Photo 26: Khuno

What does one do when they do not have children to take photos of? They take loads of photos of their dog. This picture is supposed to show off his extremely gross crinkly fur under his chin. Whenever his fur gets wet, it goes all wiry and crinkly like that. Whenever he plays with my brother's child dog, Audi, all of Audi's spit makes Khuno's fur all gross. This picture was captured a whopping 24 hours later. Yup, still wrinkly and gross. 

365 Photo Project - Photo 20

Isn't he just oh so handsome? I can't believe it's been almost 4 years since we got Khuno. He still loves that IKEA step stool and that front window. Khuno's always keeping an eye out for visitors, walkers, other dogs, rabbits, the mailman, cars, blowing leaves, flying garbage...

365 Photo Project - Photo 10

It's Saturday night and Jamie's already deep into dreamland. I just spent the last 2 hours processing some wedding photos and some random ones I took during the week. Does it look cold in the photo? Because it was stinkin' cold! I was wondering why my hands were getting so cold so fast. The walk was short as we quickly realized just how cold it was that day. My camera eventually seized up and refused to do anything half way through the walk... Fingers crossed that it's ok after it defrosts. 

365 Photo Project - Photo 6

Taking photos in low light really sucks. My camera is about a decade old and you can imagine the advances that have happened! To help get the proper exposure I had to turn up my ISO but my camera can only handle 200 and anything above makes my picture very noisy (grainy). You can see the noise inn the above shot but I didn't want to use flash and I couldn't pick a slower shutter speed because Khuno isn't a subject that would keep still. Don't you just love his little bedhead fur?